Customer Reviews

Office Depot(R) Model 183 (51640A, 51645A/G/D) Black Inkjet Refill Kit

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this product to play MP3s through my Ipod at work. However, I also use it to listen to the radio. The tuner is great because I am now able to listen to all of the FM stations in my area. With my old radio, I was only able to get one station at work. I also bought a second Tivoli at home for the same purpose and the battery runs for a very long time without recharging. This gives me the ability to take the Tivoli into any room and also allows me to listen to my ipod without the headphones.

As advertised, the PAL is the perfect porch radio. For its size and portability, the sound quality is outstanding. Reception is as good or better than any other portable I own, especially Walkman style units. But don't stray too far from the house for very long. I'm very disappointed with the battery performance of my unit. Initially I had a problem getting the battery charged. After several recommendations provided willingly by Tivoli Audio staff, I finally got the battery charged but it has never held a charge for very long. Early on, on a full charge, my PAL would play for the better part of a day (at relatively low volume) but now (the unit is about a year old) I'm lucky if it runs for much more than an hour before that battery calls it quits. I'm hoping a new battery will remedy the situation.

Since moving away from New York City, I've missed hearing the local sport teams on radio. I've tried to pick up the AM stations where I live now (outside of Cleveland) without luck until now. This great looking, great sounding radio has no trouble picking out AM radio station located over 350 miles from where its being transmitted. Local FM stations sound amazing too! Highly recommended if you want to own the best in its class.

I feel like raving about this radio, but I'm not in the mood to write a lot about it right now. Read the reviews. Most all it's attributes are here.

For naysayers and detractors, I can only say this: It was never designed to compete with a stereo boom box, whose stereo separation is overrated due to close speaker placement anyway, and it doesn't go as loud either. It's excellent for midrange tones and classical music. It's equalizer has been tuned to give the illusion of a lot of bass response by really working midranges, and in truth, it has surprisingly good bass response due to it's excellent long-throw speaker.

From a design standpoint, it is intentionally designed to do the most important tasks exceedingly well, and because it has no presets, it appeals to those to don't station surf, but have their favorite that they usually stick to most of time. What is has is an *amazingly* sensitive FM tuner capable of separating and locking on to weak and constrained signals. Even people living in Manhattan with all the steel and glass and interference are impressed by Kloss-designed tuners for their ability to separate confused signals there. I live in the woods 100 miles north of Seattle, and I'm so very pleased with it's ability to pick up several NPR stations here.

From my point of view, the only downside is cosmetic. It's hard sealed plastic case has a THIN plasticised layer on it, which makes if feel "grippy." That layer is not particularly durable. It'll start peeling off on the edges. I slapped some black gaff tape over the edges on mine, and I really don't care what it looks like anyway.

I wish it had a sleep timer....only because I'm too cheap to buy the alarm clock Tivoli...Ha!

It's been two years of daily use and I couldn't be more pleased. I look forward to many more years of use.

***UPDATE***

It's now winter of 2010. I've been using this radio now for going on 8 years.

It looks about as beat-up as ever, since I've covered it with gaff tape in 2004. The numbers on the dial have worn off...aside from that, I've replaced the plug-in recharge socket once (2006) and the plastic moisture protectors have recently worn out from the AUX IN and the POWER IN ports. Oh well. More gaff tape, I guess.

I've replaced the battery three times and I've figured out a way to make it last FAR longer for less money: Don't buy replacement batteries from Tivoli. The Tivoli replacement packs are 7.2v/1400 mAh for something like $25 (after shipping). That's a bad deal. They're using WEAK AA NiMH cells. Do this instead: visit one of those places that sells radio controlled cars and planes and buy a stacked replacement battery pack from them. I'm currently running one that has 7.2v/2400 mAh for all of $11.00 (with free shipping). And it makes a difference. I get about 40 hours of life from an upgraded battery pack instead of the usual 15 or so from the factory pack. As usual, your mileage may vary.

Overall, I'm appreciative beyond words at how much I use this thing, and how much I love it.

a nice little radio. rechargeable battery pack works well, and the radio does a good job of pulling in the stations and putting out a nice sound. there are two problems: 1) the exterior is disintegrating on mine (it has not been subjected to anything harsher than a gentle touch), and 2) the tuner, while good, is quite inferior to that of the Tivoli Model One. don't buy this radio expecting it to perform as well as a Model One - it will not(though perhaps it should, given the slightly higher price of the PAL).

I have a couple of table radios from Tivoli that I like quite well. I also very much like the comparable model (which I also have) from Boston Acoustics. As for the PAL, this is something I bought specifically to have a portable, self-contained device to play audio from my laptop from in presentations. (It also works very well to plug in any MP3 player the same way, but stereo-mini to stereo-mini plug cable.) The sound for music is not quite as good as the Inmotion IM3 which I also have and use similarly, but it's as good or better for audio in general, ruggedness, and loudness for presenting in a room. The radio is also superb, and the volume controls apparently in use on the PALs appear to me to be better in quality than on the table radios that Tivoli makes (where the volume control has a very sharp ramp up in loudness and is harder to regulate well for lower volume listening). Yes, I'm a geek.

Anyway, the PAL is a splendid device. Does all as promised with style, attractive looks, high quality audio, and with at least the appearance (and I bet the actuality) of ruggedness.

This small radio has excellent tone, clarity and available volume. It's on-battery time has so far always been adequate for hours of listening and it recharges rapidly.
It is particularly good at picking up fringe FM stations and holding signal while rejecting interference.
The soft plastic covering seems to reduce vibration and, subjectively speaking, "feels" good to the touch.
One great feature is its auxiliary input which allow a mini plug out from a computer to a mini plug into the aux input of the PAL. The result is loud, clear hearing of any internet accessible audio source. I listen to fm stations in California Tucson Philadelphia, etc. with ease. Video on the net yields excellent audio by this method.
PS I have two of them, one for some years.

This is one great radio. This is my 2nd one. I've had my 1st one for five years and purchased another for my office. Great sound, reception and great for the outdoors.

Of all my portable radios, including the Tivoli Songbook, the PAL has my richest, warmest sounding speaker. I'd give reception a B plus compared to my Kaito 1103 and Grundig G4000. The biggest downside is no presets. You have to find the sweet spot every time you tune in a desired radio station. If you want, you can "upgrade" this nice radio by connecting a ten-dollar audio cable to auxilary input of the PAL and the output of the Kaito 1103 (about 90 dollars), using the PAL as a speaker and the 1103 as the best reception radio you'll ever have.